On Wednesday morning the Southeast of Saline Football team made the decision to move to a remote learning platform for the remainder of the season. The decision came after Saline county has seen a large spike in Covid-19 cases. Although not many of these have affected SES, the coaches and administration thought it was in the best interest of the team to move to remote learning. Also, the fact that the cross country team had already undergone this precaution and were successful, was also likely a contributing factor to this decision. When asked about the decision to go remote, Head Coach Mitch Gebhardt responded:

“The final decision was made on Wednesday morning. The idea had been discussed for a while but the school has done a good job of limiting the cases. There is a big concern that the county’s covid numbers are high.  Many felt this was the right time for the players to go remote.  As far as preparation we have made many adjustments to how we do things practice, games, school and outside of school because of the uniqueness of this year.  I feel as far as practice not having the players in school will not affect our preparation,” Gebhardt said.

Adjustments had also been made in the classroom leading up to this decision. For example, football players were grouped together in various classrooms across the building to isolate them from other students. Football players are now logging into their classes remotely from home by way of Google Meets, an online video conferencing service. When asked about his experiences so far, Senior Tyler Breeding stated:

“All of the football team is working hard to keep up with online school and doing the best we can to manage assignments.” 

Being that the football team has demonstrated strong student leadership, the seniors on this year’s team have once again taken the initiative to lead the team through the unique circumstances that this year has brought about. 

“The seniors are working to make sure everyone stays on track by following our weekly process and being leaders in having focused practices and film sessions.”

Last week, the team was able to overcome some mishaps in the first half against the Marysville Bulldogs. They pulled a 20-0 win against them after recovering from the first half. This Friday, the team will head to Wichita to face the Wichita Collegiate Spartans in the sectional round of the playoffs.